Appeals court lifts Hopwood injunction

NEW ORLEANS {AP} A federal appeals court lifted an injunction barring race-based admissions at Texas public universities and sent the case back for further hearings.

The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Thursday that U.S. District Judge Sam Spark's injunction against using race as a factor for entry into college goes against a 1978 U.S. Supreme Court decision.

The court ruled that Sparks failed to justify the injunction that conflicts with the Supreme Court's Bakke vs. University of California ruling.

It was an apparent victory for Texas colleges, whose attorneys used the case to re-open the question of affirmative action in Texas.

Four white students, who sued the University of Texas over allegedly being rejected because of their race, went to the appellate court in June seeking to overturn Sparks' ruling that awarded them $1 in damages and $750,000 in attorneys' fees.

The three-judge panel struck down the students' request for more attorneys' fees and damages while taking up the state's arguments.

"Nowhere to be found in the district court's lengthy and otherwise thorough opinion are any express findings of fact or conclusions of law addressing or supporting the need for an injunction," the ruling said.

"We are left with no choice, therefore, but to reverse the court's injunction," the opinion said.

The panel said the district court needs to "explicate its findings and conclusions if it should perceive a need to issue an injunction."

The panel found that using race to remedy past discrimination is lawful.

"The Supreme Court has conclusively established that the government can, consistent with the Constitution, use racial preferences under particular circumstances to remedy the present effects of past discrimination," it said.

In the Bakke case, the Supreme Court struck down the use of racial quotas in school admissions, but it did allow schools to consider race in deciding which students to accept.

Texas lawyers argued in the so-called Hopwood case, named after one of the students, that the state should never have been blocked from using affirmative action.

A separate three-judge panel of the 5th Circuit ruled in 1996 in favor of the white students and that ruling led to the injunction.